Artifact Details

Title

CONS Machine main board

Catalog Number

102647223

Type

Physical object

Description

Object is a large wirewrap board that can accommodate up to 900 DIP integrated circuits. Five AUGAT wire wrap prototype boards are mounted on a rugged steel frame. Bus bars supply power and ground to the prototype boards. One side of each board has sockets for 180 DIPs and the other side has the associated wire wrap pins. The wire wrap side has several layers of wire-wrap connections and is protected by a Plexiglas sheet. On the Plexiglass is a hand written sticker from the The Computer Museum in Boston. It reads: 'This board was displayed on the "a brief history of robots and artificial intelligence" wall, Robots area, 6th floor. I found no explanation on what it is; possibly, part of PDP-10. 12/10/99 S.E.' A tag attached to the board reads "BACKPLANE CONS MACHINE". This is probably the backplane from a CONS (or Knight) Lisp machine developed at the MIT AI Labs in the early 1970's.

Manufacturer

M.I.T.

Identifying Numbers

Other number 8136-PG21-180TG Part number near corner on top of each of 5 Augat modules

Dimensions

overall: 2 1/2 in x 39 1/2 in x 18 3/4 in

Category

interconnect/backplane